


five in the morning in almaty

by m (pistachiomadeleines)



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Drunk Texting, Irresponsibility, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-01-27
Packaged: 2018-09-20 06:43:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9479840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pistachiomadeleines/pseuds/m
Summary: Yuri drunk-texts his long-suffering best friend, Otabek Altin.





	

At three thirty a.m. in Almaty, the little notification bulb at the corner of Otabek's Samsung galaxy fills with lilac light, and his phone buzzes once from the charging port all the way at the other end of the bedroom.  Otabek shifts his weight on the mattress, but he doesn't stir.

At four a.m. in Almaty, the phone vibrates again, three times.  And again, two times.  And by four thirty a.m., it's been gripped by a seizure so violent that Otabek finally forces his eyelids open and sits up in bed.

Cursing swiftly in Kazakh, he picks his way through the darkened room and sinks cross-legged onto the floor.  Twenty two new whatsapp messages from Yuri Plisetsky light up his phone, the first a selfie of Yuri, Yuuri, Viktor and - who's that girl?  oh yeah, Mila Babicheva - pulling faces beneath a string of christmas lights in what seems to be Viktor's garden, and then a succession of texts that can only have been typed by a drunken hand.  They begin

 

[3:58 a.m.] this party blows everyones coupled off save me

[3:58 a.m.] r u awake old man

[3:59 a.m.] y do u go to sleep so early

[4:00 a.m.] o shit sorry just remembered the time difference

[4:00 a.m.] its like 4 in the morning there isnt it

[4:12 a.m.] hey otababe

[4:12 a.m.] *otabek sorry autocorrect

[4:18 a.m.] fuck

 

and end, time-stamped two minutes ago, with Yuri declaring that he's "outta here".  Otabek jabs at the call symbol, frowning.

"Hey, you alright?" he says when Yuri picks up.  

"Shit, did I wake you?" slurs Yuri drunkenly.  There's a low roar through the phone that suggests hard plastic wheels passing over asphalt, and Otabek realizes he's on his skateboard.  "Sorry, sorry, sorry.  I'm fine, don't worry, just riding my skateboard back to my grandpa's place."

"Why not stay over and ride home in the morning?" suggests Otabek.

"Nyet, people were dancing on the couch."

"Well, what about a taxi?"

"It's too nice a night for taxis."

Otabek sighs, even as he listens to the sound of Yuri stumbling on his skateboard then starting up again.  "Alright, just be careful."  He repositions himself on the floor, stretching out his legs and leaning back against the foot of the bed, some tension released from the knowledge that Yuri is alright.  "So the party sucked, huh?"

"It was fine at first," says Yuri.  There's a pause that's filled by another stumble, and a long scrape that sounds like wood grinding against the curb, and then the dull thud of a foot pushing off the ground and the skateboard speeding up.  Yuri goes on.  "Didn't know too many people there, but a small group of us were hanging out and drinking and talking.  And theeen someone had the idea to take out an ouija board, and Katsudon wanted to commune with his dead poodle-"

"Dog people," Otabek mutters disapprovingly.

"-Exactly.  And Katsudon and Viktor started crying, and we all did shots.  And then I was alone."

"And texting me."

"And texting you," says Yuri sheepishly.  "Sorry."

Otabek opens his mouth to say something, perhaps bring up the matter of Yuri's phone autocorrecting his name to _otababe_ , but is interrupted by the sharp scrape of wheels coming to a halt.

Something's happening, there's shouting - he makes out the word _bite_ , and the word _asshole_ , and then the word _sewer_ , but the gist of the exchange escapes him, the sounds losing their shape as they pass through the speakers - and then the wheels start up again.  "Yuri?   _Yuri_?"

"Sorry about that," Yuri says calmly and more soberly, thirty heart stopping seconds later.  "You won't believe what just happened.  I just got catcalled."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah, some skinhead was like smile, princess.  I said, I'll bite your cock off, asshole, and spit it out into the sewer.  And then he started chasing me and I had to take off."

"Oh, my god," says Otabek faintly, pressing his fingertips to his temples.  "You're going to get murdered, Plisetsky."

"Mmm," says Yuri.  "I'm almost home anyway.  Uh oh, phone's about to die.."

Otabek shakes his head in disbelief.

"Text you when I get back?"

"Please do.  And actually be careful this time," he adds, but Yuri is gone.

Otabek sighs and put his phone away.  Despite what his punk aesthetic might suggest, he's never, unlike Yuri and everyone else his age, understood the impulse to live fast and die young.  He _likes_ going to bed early.  He avoids alcohol and parties, preferring to restrict himself to two kinds of highs - the calm of cruising around on his motorbike, and the euphoria of perfecting a jump on the ice.

It's five in the morning now, too late to crawl back into bed.  A gray twilight has crept into the room through the curtains, and the sun is minutes away from rising.  A couple of hours later, thinks Otabek, remembering the long summer days he spent in Russia as a child, it will rise over Moscow while he makes his way to practice.

He stands up and cracks his back, yawning.  Pulls on his sweatpants.  Pads into the kitchen with his laptop tucked under one arm and his phone in the other hand and starts making tea.

And at five thirteen a.m., as the sky turns gold over Almaty, Otabek glances up from googling Moscow crime rates to pick up his buzzing phone.

"Hey, you got home ok?"  His voice a murmur, kept low so as not to awaken the rest of his sleeping household.

"Yeah," says Yuri, yawning.  "Just got into bed.  Managed not to wake my grandpa, or get murdered."

"I'm glad," says Otabek, drily but sincerely.

"Thanks for staying up with me tonight."

A single puffy cloud floats serenely across the mountains through the window, and Otabek says, "No problem."

"Alright, I think I'm going to bed," says Yuri.  "Good night, Beka."

 _First Otababe and now Beka_ , marvels Otabek, who's only ever heard terms of endearment like 'asshole' and 'fucker' from Yuri's mouth before.  Alcohol, or exhaustion, must have addled the poor lad's brain.  "Good night, princess," he says, and hangs up.

He drains his tea.  Getting to his feet, he begins to work slowly through his morning stretches.  First his neck, and then his back, and then the muscles in his arms.  There's a slight tiredness in his brain but he doesn't mind, really.  It's nothing coffee can't solve, and anyway, he's glad to have finally caught his first sunrise in years.

 


End file.
